A top-tier research professional's hand-picked selection of documents from academe, corporations, government agencies (including the Congressional Research Service), interest groups, NGOs, professional societies, research institutes, think tanks, trade associations, and more.

Fast Tracked trade deals have exacerbated the income inequality crisis, pushed good American jobs overseas, driven down U.S. wages, exploded the trade deficit and diminished small businesses’ share of U.S. exports, a new report from Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch shows. The report, “Prosperity Undermined,”compiles and analyzes 20 years of trade and economic data to show that the arguments again being made in favor of providing the Obama administration with Fast Track trade authority have repeatedly proved false.

This leaflet provides a compilation of papers prepared by the European Parliament’s Policy Departments in relation to the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. The magnitude of the transatlantic economic exchange and the chance to boost growth and create jobs provided the initial impetus for launching talks on the TTIP. The EP has supported the negotiations while expressing caution about several sensitive issues. Papers produced by the Policy Departments have addressed these and other issues, including the potential implications on EU Member States, the US Congress’s view of the Partnership, and its impact on areas such as employment and agriculture.

This paper explores resource nationalism, particularly for energy and metal and mineral supplies, and the potential implications for the UK.

Resource nationalism is defined as anti-competitive behaviour designed to restrict the international supply of a natural resource. Population growth, the uneven worldwide distribution of resources, and governance issues can lead to resource nationalism.

Resource nationalism is likely to have a greater effect on global terms of trade when a natural resource is only produced in few countries. In these markets, countries can affect global prices for raw materials and have most to gain from resource nationalism. In these cases, there is potential for the main producers (companies or countries) to act together to manipulate global prices.

The risk of resource nationalism may be higher for some lesser-known metals and minerals than resources such as oil, coal and gas.

This paper presents long-term trade scenarios for the world economy up to 2060 based on a modelling approach that combines aggregate growth projections for the world with a detailed computable general equilibrium sectoral trade model. The analysis suggests that over the next 50 years, the geographical centre of trade will continue to shift from OECD to non-OECD regions reflecting faster growth in non-OECD countries. The relative importance of different regions in specific export markets is set to change markedly over the next half century with emerging economies gaining export shares in manufacturing and services. Trade liberalisation, including gradual removal of tariffs, regulatory barriers in services and agricultural support, as well as a reduction in transaction costs on goods, could increase global trade and GDP over the next 50 years. Specific scenarios of regional liberalisation among a core group of OECD countries or partial multilateral liberalisation could, respectively, raise trade by 4% and 15% and GDP by 0.6% and 2.8% by 2060 relative to the status quo. Finally, the model highlights that investment in education has an influence on trade and high-skill specialisation patterns over the coming decades. Slower educational upgrading in key emerging economies than expected in the baseline scenario could reduce world exports by 2% by 2060. Lower up-skilling in emerging economies would also slow-down the restructuring towards higher value-added activities in these emerging economies.

During an era of oil price controls and following the 1973 Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries oil embargo, Congress passed the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975 (EPCA), which directs the President “to promulgate a rule prohibiting the export of crude oil” produced in the United States. Crude oil export restrictions are codified in the Export Administration Regulations administered by the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS)—a Commerce Department agency. Generally, U.S. crude oil exports are prohibited, although there are a number of exemptions and circumstances under which crude oil exports are allowed. The President has authority

In 2009, a decades-long U.S. oil production decline was reversed due to the application of advanced drilling and extraction technologies to produce tight oil, generally light/sweet crude primarily located in Texas and North Dakota. Limited demand for tight oil and condensate being produced in the Texas/Gulf Coast region may result because certain refiners in that region are currently configured to process heavier crudes. As a result, oil producers and industry analysts are projecting an oversupply of light oil, which could lead to price discounts and lower production should export restrictions remain. However, the industry is dynamic, and refiners can modify operating configurations and add equipment in order to accommodate more light crude volumes. Price discounts may be needed to motivate such changes.

Broad-based preliminary estimates suggest implementation of TIR could boost exports in Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico by $1-$5 billion per annum, depending on the country, for a total of $9 billion per annum for all three countries. This report, produced by Oxford Economics, explores the maritime and road transport systems in international transport, focusing on trade facilitation and the potential for improvements in trade systems in Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico with implementation of the TIR system, as well as potential challenges.